Like Ash in the Wind
by Pyrinsomniac
Summary: Various drabblythings.
1. Gambit's Gloves

Henri glanced curiously at his little brother's gloved hands. "Changin' t'ings up?"

Remy's demon eyes flicked down; the barest hint of a smile crossed his handsome face. "Guess y' could say dat."

Henri arched an eyebrow. "Any pa'ticular reason why?"

_The barest brush of his pinky finger against her lily cheek and the world reverses itself; suddenly he's on the ground and she's standing over him, clutching the front of his trench coat, green eyes blazing. He has a hard time focusing on her anger when they're sparking like that... _

Gambit shrugged. "Not really. Variety's the spice o' life, right?" He favored Henri with a blinding grin, and the older thief snorted. "Riiiiight. Still don' understand the point of havin' half y' fingers covered an' half not, though."

"_Mon frere_, what you don' know could fill the Grand Canyon."

Even through the bickering, the memory stayed vivid in the back of his mind; those green, green eyes framed with white on a full- moon night in the bayou.


	2. One Too Many

The straw that broke the camel's back. The snowflake that started the avalanche. The last straw, the last nerve, the _had- it- up- to- here._

Humans can only take so much.

It's not big and grand, like you'd expect. It's not an arched- back, chest out, fists rigid at the sides scream. It's not a catastrophic explosion or a burst of uncontrolled power. It's quiet, and unassuming, and it takes them a minute to realize something's wrong.

Her mouth drops open slightly and she bends at the waist, just a bit, hands going to her head and clutching the streaks of white that frame her face. Her eyes go blank.

They've seen her disoriented after an absorption before, so they assume she'll be fine this time, too. But she doesn't snap out of it, doesn't come back to herself, and from what little they can tell she has no concept of who she is anymore. She's bits and pieces, scattered in the wind.


	3. 360

She's always thought she was better than him.

(Because she was, is, but Duncan isn't about to admit this to himself or anyone else.)

He'd wanted her because she was the most beautiful (because Jean, no matter what else she is, is and always has been something beyond just pretty;) because she was one of the most popular girls in school, a star soccer player, and that she was smart and a genuinely kind, good person were of distinctly secondary importance to Duncan.

Jean seemed to embody the American Dream, the American ideal.

And he, the star football player, an all around good athlete and for the most part genial high school jock, seemed to be the perfect match for her.

The truth was, they'd sort of fallen into it because it seemed like the thing to do.

And if there was a part of him that resented her because she was smarter than him and of better character, everything else overrode it.

If there was a part of her that wondered what she was doing with an immature, mostly- insensitive, self centered jock cliché, she didn't dwell on it. It was nice, being normal in one aspect of her life. It was nice, not having to think about Annie and such weighty matters; to be thought of as a girl first, to be appreciated (sometimes) for being merely Jean and not Jean Grey, telepath and telekinetic. Jean Grey, the Professor's second student and protégé in mutations of the mind; Jean Grey, who alongside Cyclops watched over the younger mutants and provided an example for them, who worked to keep her own incredible powers in check.

If training was Scott's escape, if angst and depressing books and music and darkness in general were Rogue's, if laughter was Kitty and Kurt's, then normality and Duncan were Jean's.

And now the world has done a 360 on her; the mansion is her escape from the world, and school is more challenging than coming to terms with and controlling her power. Duncan has turned from an easy, comforting diversion to a symbol for all the things bearing down upon Jean and her kind.

Not having an overly developed sense of fairness or any desire to think things out puts Duncan in a much easier position than Jean. He doesn't think about why he feels betrayed; simply accepts that he has been, and reacts accordingly. He doesn't think about why his feelings toward a girl he'd genuinely cared for (if in an extremely limited capacity) have changed so drastically; doesn't dwell on why the idea of mutants is so reprehensible to him.

Duncan _thinks_ very rarely, and this is not worth his time or effort.

And so now they find themselves at an impasse; on opposite sides of a debate Duncan would turn into a war and Jean into an opportunity for betterment.

It's only now that Jean bothers to acknowledge how very little Duncan meant to her, how very trivial high school is.

She's grateful (guiltily so, but still grateful,) to have gone through it the way she did; to have a good high school experience while still being able to stand with her _real_ friends at the end of it.

Jean doesn't dwell on it, tries not to think about it too much, but she's also profoundly relieved that Kurt was the one who struggled most with giving up their shot at a (somewhat) normal school life. Relieved that when it came down to the line, she kept her chin up and back straight, because she hadn't been sure she'd have the strength.

(Though she does acknowledge that had their coming out happened when she was Kurt's age, she likely would've reacted the same way he did.)

Jean is determined to go to college, to get an education and return to the Institute to share what she's learned with the younger mutants. Jean has something to fight for.

Duncan has something to fight against, and the difference is everything that divides them and always will.

- X -

A/N: Okay, so is it 360 or 380? It's been about 5 or 6 years since I had Geometry and I've always sucked at math. I tried to ask Jeeves and he said 360.


	4. The Red

She hates him.

Not as much as she hates Magneto, of course- because she hates Magneto with a passion that has eroded everything else about her- but she hates him more than she hates the guards who manhandle her, the orderlies who drug her, the people who are the lifeblood of the institution she's confined to.

She hates him because he knows _exactly_ how much she hates this place, how badly she needs to be away from here, and he has a safe haven. He dangles it in front of her like a carrot on a string, telling her that if she'll only let go of her anger, if she could only take control, he'd take her away from all these things she hates.

He doesn't understand that that hatred is all she has. He refuses to acknowledge that she has the right to her hate, and that all this place does is feed it. He sees it all, but he doesn't understand. He wants her to be good. He wants her to hope, to manage her emotions and by extension her power, to heal and be happy. He genuinely wants to help her.

It is for that reason he cannot. It is impossible for him to comprehend just how broken she is, to acknowledge the extension of the damage, because Charles Xavier is above all an idealist. He has an ironclad devotion to hope; he does not allow himself to believe that it is impossible for mutants and humans to live peaceably together, and he does not allow himself to believe that Wanda is beyond redemption.

And so when he comes, talking to her of _control_ and _peace_ and _possibilities_, she hates him all the more.


	5. Legacy

She's wondered before what she'd give up to be free of her mutation. She'd be lying if she said death hadn't occurred to her, or some kind of miracle cure; but this cure is more curse than miracle.

Just like her powers.

She regards her ungloved hands with something like wonder. The blood transfusions still give her the powers of others (and their memories; God, she hates the things she sees!) but the skin transference is delayed now. Only by minutes, it's true, but it's more than she's had for the vast majority of her life.

The delay gets longer the sicker she gets.

The rumbling gets stronger, and makes her think of Avalanche. She wonders if the Sentinels got him, too. She hopes not. Bad enough to know of the other experiments here, known to her only through their memories.

She can hear Stormtroopers, as she's privately termed them, rushing past her cell, hear the sounds of a fight in the not- so- very- far distance. Probably another escape attempt by one of the feistier ones. She's not worried. By now it doesn't matter whether the place falls down around her ears or not, and they always subdue whoever it is, anyway.

It's getting closer, she notices. She dozes off (she's been doing that more and more lately; she feels eighty more than eighteen) but comes awake at the gasp in the doorway.

"Rogue..." she hears someone almost- whimper in the doorway (but not quite, because he just doesn't make sounds like that, never.)

It's the voice that brings her awake, gives her the strength to turn her head.

She tries to muster up a smile. "Took y'all long enough." she rasps.

"God, Stripes," he says, and she can hear French cursing in the background.

"Homme," she hears another male she can't immediately identify, "we gotta haul ass!"

"Elf," she hears Wolverine roar, "get yer ass down here!"

She could imagine Cyclops' reaction even if she hadn't been able to hear the indignant squawking from the communicators both X Men wear. "I'll take care of the goddamned guards," growls Wolverine, and he's never sounded more like the animal he's named after. "We found Rogue."

A BAMF! later, she smells brimstone. Kurt stops short at the sight of her, eyes widening. "Mein Gott..." he whispers.

"Go now, react later!" Gambit snaps, shoving the teleporter over to the bedside.

He slides an arm under her shoulders, brings the other one around near her collarbone, and drops his face to her hair in a gentle hug. She feels tears on her scalp just before they vanish.

-

"Well?" Wolverine pounces the minute Hank emerges from his lab, looking as downcast as Xavier has ever seen him. His heart drops.

Beast raises his head, meets Wolverine's fierce gaze with a sorrowful one. "It's a virus; they call it Legacy. It isolates and attacks the X- gene. They were trying to find a cure for mutantism," he shakes his head, "but instead it destabilizes the entire DNA strand-"

"But what does that mean for Rogue?" Kurt asks desperately.

Hank can't look at him. "It means," he says quietly, "that she's falling apart at the most basic level. I can't even counter it, since it's a virus instead of a bacteria... I'll send samples to Reed Richards and some other scientists, but..."

Wolverine makes a choked sound somewhere between a cry and a roar and storms from the room. Kurt instead pushes forward, into the infirmary where Rogue lay.

Cyclops' hands fist at his sides; Jean lays a hand on his shoulder. The Professor sits there, trying to think of anything that could make this the least bit better.


	6. Exile

Remy LeBeau was eighteen years old, a thief but never before a murderer, and he'd been married less than an hour before his brother in law attempted to kill him.

Julien is resting with the eldest of the Bordreaux clan now, Assassins all, rotting down in a beautifully decorated graveyard only nominally protected from the swamp.

Jean Luc is sitting behind his massive desk, trying to forestall a war. Henri stays quietly at his father's right hand, just where he's always been, doing what he's always done: Jean Luc's bidding.

Marius too is there, bearing his grief in the lines of his face and the terrible heaviness in his eyes.

More Assassins and Thieves die the longer the heads of the two clans confer.

Mattie's lips are tight as she heals and buries children she's raised on both sides. Two of them are missing: her demon eyed boy and lethal golden haired girl, both vanished into the bayou.

Mattie patches up what she can, and waits for them to come back.

X

Belladonna returns alone; her eyes dry and hard, back straight, shoulders back and chin up.

She returns questions with short, clipped answers, and gives an entire detailed story to an audience of only four people: her father, Jean Luc, Mattie, and Henri LeBeau. The warring Guilds are made to understand that Remy LeBeau is banished, and may be killed on sight for the death of Julien Bordreaux should he ever return to New Orleans. In exchange, he will not be hunted down and killed, and there shall be no more bloodshed between the Thieves and Assassins' Guilds.

The marriage is still binding, the Guilds still united. In her estranged husband's absence Belladonna Bordreaux will be her father's right hand, as Henri LeBeau is to his father, and they will work together to manage the Thieves and Assassins. When Marius and Jean Luc die, Belladonna will oversee both Guilds.

Remy LeBeau has played his part, expended his usefulness, and no longer has a place at home.

X

If there was one thing Jean Luc ever taught Remy, if there was one thing that held true throughout his life, it was that ultimately you were alone in the world. Not even family could or would always be there, and success in life consisted of always being able to drag yourself back up on your own two feet.

It is a lesson Gambit brands into his heart, and he carries it with him into the world with the stigma of banishment.


	7. Roommate

_One kiss. _

_A kiss at the end of the world. She tries to pull away as soon as their lips touch, too conditioned and too fearful even now, but Gambit threads his fingers into her hair and makes her take it all. If he has to die, he wants to drown in her. _

_She stumbles back as he collapses, clutching her head, tears pouring down her face, eyes wide and darkening into black and red. Blood and death, Le Diable Blanc… _

_She knows, she understands it all. Finally they're equal; finally she knows as much about him as he does her (quite possibly more.) He's given his all to her, invites her to sit in judgment. _

_They're going to dance the tango in hell. _

But they hadn't died, none of them had, and that's the problem.

They've come to an agreement, now. She hasn't quite forgiven his sins but she understands them, accepts things and has moved on, and that has to be enough for him. For now, at least.

He's forced her to loosen up. Remy's poked and prodded her into playing dress up: into experimenting with different weights and textures of cloth, mixing styles, figuring out just how much skin she can leave uncovered and where. He nagged her until she sat down and started messing around with her makeup, using it to enhance her features instead of hiding them behind a heavy Gothic mask.

_You better off wit'out dat stuff, chere._ he tells her. _You a beautiful woman, Rogue. Don' be 'fraid of it. _

_I'm not __**that**__ good lookin', Swamp Rat. Don't try'n make me as vain as you._ she retorts, but he knows she's blushing. She can feel his answering mental grin. _'Sides, Gambit, there's no point in it. Ah cain't touch, remember? _

_So? Dere's more t' life than touch, Rogue. Sucks that you can't, but 's not the end of the world. _

_Sure._ she agrees heavily, and he can feel the tears in it. He gives her the mental impression of a frown.

_Chere. Whole reason you were so- so- _he'd be wheeling a free hand around in the air if he'd had one, but there's no need for him to spell it out- _after y' absorbed me was 'cause I was more'n you bargained for, hein? _

She doesn't argue; encouraged, he presses on.

_Dere's a million ways t' keep people at arm's length, Rogue, an' snarlin's the least of 'em. You play it right, they don' even realize it 'less somebody starts nosin' round, askin' the right questions. _

_An' by then you're long gone, huh. _she comments.

He can't think of a reply that won't set her off, so he says nothing at all.

She studies her face in the vanity and finishes up with a light lip gloss. As she takes the applicator away, there's a perfunctory knock on the door. "Hey, Rogue, have you seen my-" Kitty sticks her head through the wall and stops, meeting the older girl's eyes in the mirror.

Rogue looks back, somewhat nervous; Remy looks on, amused.

With a perfectly level face, Shadowcat phases the rest of the way into the room, takes a few steps-

- and her face splits into a grin of unholy glee as she flings herself onto the other mutant with a squeal.

Rogue instinctively shrinks away, but the vanity presses into her back and she goes through it when Kitty makes contact. The velocity of the tackle is such that they should by all rights go through the wall into the next room, but Kitty expertly swirls them back out again and into open space.

Rogue takes the opportunity to try to jerk away- _You're __**not**__ helpin'_- she hisses to the Remy chortling in her head- but Kitty's like a bulldog. She keeps a firm grip on Rogue and flings herself at the wall, phasing them both through it. Flashbacks of driving with the merrily fearless teenager paralyze Rogue into compliance as Shadowcat drags her through the walls of the mansion until they reach the far end of the hall.

"Jean!" Kitty shrieks.

The redhead pelts out of her room looking alarmed; the expression doesn't ease when she sees the younger girls.

"Mall! Now!" Kitty barks.

Amara's door flings open. "Mall?"

"NO!" Rogue yells in a panic.

Remy's chortles have morphed into a full- blown belly laugh.

-X-

Some three hours later, the laugh has completely disappeared.

Rogue bolts for her room the instant Jean's SUV comes to a stop in the garage; the girls are too satisfied with the day's shopping to try to stop her, and the boys who see her go tearing through the mansion aren't fool enough to get in her way.

She makes it interference- free, but shuts and locks the door anyway. Rogue rests her back against it and allows herself a long, pained sigh.

_M- Mon Dieu!_ Remy finally comments, sounding shell shocked.

_Ah __**tole**__ you so!_ Rogue snarls, tossing her bags on her bed and pushing herself off the door to join them.

_Sorry, chere._ She snorts; he actually sounds sincere. _Didn' know what I was gettin' us into. _

_Like __**hell**__ you didn't._ she retorts testily. _Don't think Ah didn' hear you when we went in Victoria's Secret! _

_Hee. Yeah. Gotta admit, dat mighta made th' whole t'ing worthwhile._

Had he been in his own body, she'd have been forced to slap him; as it is, Rogue is hard pressed to stifle her grin.

He drives her crazy half the time, but there is no denying Remy LeBeau is spending his formless existence in her head trying to help her. And Lord help them both, he's by and large succeeding.

Rogue smiles.


	8. Le Diable

Originally, his powers were a fairly subtle thing when taken in their entirety. He'd always been able to move better than anyone else, to bend in ways that seemed to subvert the laws of physics, and he was as fast as he was nimble. He was remarkably sharp eyed, even by Thief standards.

Then his eyes started glowing red at night, and Remy found that he could see in the dark.

He charged an object for the first time when he was thirteen.

He loved his powers. His sight adjusted to the light available, and he could blow up inorganic objects at will, with nothing more than a touch.

Explosions were fun.

Explosions were _really_ freakin' fun.

It was sometime after he started working for Magneto that his eyes changed and stayed that way- black sclera and red irises- but he didn't mind too much. They were hidden easily enough, and now he could see in infrared, which made thieving _so_ much more convenient.

Not long after that, his powers started acting up. An explosion would be more powerful than he'd meant for it to be, or his cards would blow up before he'd meant them to (he was just glad Pyro wasn't around to see this, because he _really_ didn't need any cracks about "premature detonations" and their possible reflections on his performance in the bedroom.)

He was eighteen the first time he charged an object without touching it.

He was eighteen the first time he charged a living thing.

The explosions kept getting more powerful. The glow surrounding whatever he charged became more intense, the whine from overexcited molecules kept getting louder and higher pitched.

Then there was the theater…

So it was that at nineteen years of age, a young man named Remy LeBeau found himself standing in front of the devil.

"Control." Gambit responded when asked what he wanted, and Sinister smiled.


	9. Challenge

She only dares to ask him once. "Is it... is it _me_ you want, or just the challenge?"

The devil's eyes gleam, and she immediately knows with a sinking feeling that she's about to get some impossibly charming half- truth

_because those are the most believable lies_

"Ah, _cherie_," he sighs in a tone that would bring a blush to the cheeks of a less hardened girl, "it's _all_ of you. Every bit," his eyes trail lasciviously down her body and she smacks him with one gloved hand, more out of habit than anything. In response Gambit tilts her chin up, his skin so close to hers she can feel its heat, and holds her gaze. "Rogue, I want whatever you're willin' t'give me."

Her cat's eyes narrow. It hadn't been an entirely fair question and she'd known that even before she voiced it, but she'd needed to hear his answer; and she knows he'd been honest

_as much as he ever is, or can be_

but he'd turned it back around on her, put the ball back in her court, and it's as frustrating as it is scintillating. He is always her equal and sometimes her better, but no matter what, Gambit always drives her mad.

His laughter rings behind her as she takes flight; the smug sonnuvabitch knows it, too.


End file.
